Adventures in a Korean Emergency Room
I’m in South Korea visiting my daughter and attending a Rotary convention. Yesterday, I tried to attend a breakfast at the convention that started at 7:30 am. I’m an hour and a half by bus from the convention site so I left at 5:15 am, without benefit of coffee, and headed towards the bus stop. Getting there entails crossing six lanes of traffic. There is a stop light and a walk sign. As I rounded the corner I noticed that the walk sign was lit with fourteen seconds showing on the sign and counting down.
I’m not 35 anymore. I’m 64. I thought I could sprint across the intersection in record time. Four or five long strides into my sprint, about one third of the way across, my left leg refused to move forward. I was made aware of this fact by the sharp pain of a muscle ripping apart. Then, I felt the unusual sensation of flying through the air. The next thing I remember is my head hitting the pavement. I don’t know if I was unconscious for any amount of time but when I became aware of my surroundings, I realized that I was face down in the middle of a six lane highway.
When I tried to get up I discovered that my left leg was almost useless, painfully refusing to allow me to stand or walk normally. I felt the trickle of liquid dripping down my forehead. I tried to raise my right arm but discovered, to my surprise, that moving it caused another burst of extreme pain. A great lump protruded from the side.
“Oh crap, I’ve broken my arm,” I thought. In spite of the pain I did manage to raise my arm and wipe away the blood. My right arm was writhing in pain and my right hand was covered in blood.
I was still in the middle of the street. I hopped to the curb, dragging my left leg as I went. I sat down on the stoop of an unopened store while I tried to get my bearings and catch my breath. Apparently I sat there for almost two hours because by the time I got back to my daughters apartment it was 7:15. I don’t remember much of the hundred yard journey. As I hopped up the stairs I realized that I had lost my glasses.
My daughter made coffee and cleaned my wounds while we debated what to do. She thought I needed to go to a hospital but was reluctant to call an ambulance. The best hospital in Seoul is, apparently, only three buildings down the street from her apartment. We talked about what to do but as time went on I was beginning to feel better and she had to get to work. I thought that if I managed to get back to the convention, where there were 45,000 Rotarians and a medical staff prepared for a mini disaster, I’d be in good hands.
My daughter walked me back to the bus stop, I dragged my leg and didn’t try to sprint across this time. She made sure I was on the bus before going to work. I fell asleep. An hour and a half later I struggled off the bus at the convention center. The bus driver helped me off, glad, I think, to be rid of me. I hobbled off towards the Rotary venue looking for the yellow jacketed “Sergeant-at-Arms” who, I knew, could help me out. When I found one she helped me get to the medical office by pushing me there on a wheeled office chair. Once there, the nurse in charge took one look at me and said we’re sending you to the hospital.
After a dozen or so Rotary officials and other medical staff checked me out (apparently I was the big excitement for the day), an ambulance was called and I was lifted onto a gurney for the three minute, very bumpy, ride to the hospital. I was in a lot of pain but that was overridden by the sense of adventure. How many people get to experience an emergency room in a country where no one speaks your language? Call me crazy but I was actually enjoying it.
A nurse that spoke very broken English came with us in the ambulance and explained to the triage nurse at the hospital that she thought I might have some broken bones and a concussion. In less than 15 minutes (yes 15 minutes) I was off to get a CAT scan. That took five minutes, then off to the X-Ray room for some very painful contortions while they took pictures of my arm, elbow and left hip. Ten minutes later I was back in a bay in the emergency room. Half an hour later a doctor came to tell me (in slightly better than broken English) that nothing was broken but that there might be some hairline fractures that don’t show up on X-Rays. Five minutes after that a nurse came over with discharge papers, all in Korean and pointed towards the exit. I walked, or hobbled, the 75 feet to the discharge desk where I was handed a bill for 328,000 Korean Won, about $328 US. They took VISA.
After a $3 cab ride, I was back at the Rotary venue in time for the closing ceremonies. Korean pop star Psy opened the show. He’s a Rotarian (So is Bono). He did three songs including Gangnam Style.
If this happened in the US, it would have been an all day affair. I would have been charged $500 just for the ambulance ride and I would have sat in the triage room for three or four hours before anyone bothered to see me. The X-Rays and CAT scan would have taken more hours and I would have been handed a bill for thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars. The US has become a third rate country when it comes to medicine and technology. We really should be ashamed of ourselves.
